6 ms·

This sounds like someone installed an auto start system in their manual transmission car and bypassed the neutral sensor.

ComputerGuru 7y ago
I’m always confused when someone parks my car and I find they parked it in first rather than neutral plus the handbrake (High gradients excepted, where both should be used regardless of preference). People that learn it one way will never do it the other. (Also, yes, the 2002 IS300 was available in stick.)
- epanchin 7y ago
  In the UK where stick is normal, we’re taught to park in gear + handbrake. The handbrake can start slipping when the brakes cool and the car could roll, so both are necessary, especially on a hill.
  - StrangeSound 7y ago
    Anecdotally [UK], I can't say that I nor anyone that I've noticed ever park in gear. With parking on hills being the only exception.
    - gerdesj 7y ago
      Anecdotally (UK), I do sometimes park in gear as well as the hand brake and I know others. I evaluate the situation first and use the appropriate combination. It may sound a bit excessive but a mental risk assessment takes seconds.
    - zelos 7y ago
      My UK driving instructor told me I should park with the car in reverse gear if you're pointing down a hill. I was never quite sure of the logic behind that.
      - wccrawford 7y ago
        Someone above was worried about "running the engine in reverse" when using reverse gear, so I'm guessing the idea is to match the direction the car will roll if something happens.
  - _ZeD_ 7y ago
    same in italy.
  - LatteLazy 7y ago
    I wasn't (test passed in 2009 I think). And that was in Exeter (very hilly area). Only if it's very steep were we told we could do that...
  - reallydontask 7y ago
    Same advice given to me in Spain (circa 2001)
- climb_stealth 7y ago
  I have been taught to park cars in first gear and pull the handbrake as well. And along the same line to always check that the car is in neutral before starting it. Maybe it is not current anymore, but I have always been instilled a certain distrust of handbrakes. :)
  - scoofy 7y ago
    Handbrake first, let car rest, then set in first gear. If you do it the other way around, you're resting the gears under load.
    - adrianN 7y ago
      Why is that bad? The gears surely take orders of magnitude more load in a moving car.
      - pfranz 7y ago
        I always imagined it was a sustained load on a few teeth of the gear instead of constantly distributed as the gears turn.
        AndrewThrowaway 7y ago
        I wonder what would be the load compared to a speeding car. Lets say car is standing on 10% incline, first gear, something like three teeth engaged. What is the load to one teeth? Now lets say you have started the car and accelerate it to something like 30km/h in this incline before changing to second gear. What was the load to one tooth in the time of acceleration?
        newnewpdro 7y ago
        There's basically no compression when an engine isn't running at least at hundreds of RPMs. It's a non-issue for the gears. You can turn a 4-cylinder crank with your bare hands. There's very little load, you're just overcoming the static friction of bearings, piston rings, and compressing valve springs. At the static to creeping rate we're talking, the cylinder fluids leak right through the piston ring gaps. If you want to worry about something with regard to statically loading everything, it's a lack of lubrication that should worry you. The engine isn't maintaining oil pressure when stopped. So you're leaving the crank bearings loaded in one spot while oil slowly squeezes out. "Frictionless" oil film bearings are made of relatively soft metals, so this isn't exactly good for the engine. Also the gearbox isn't dispersing oil as it does when driving. So the gears are slowly drying up while loaded. I'd be more concerned about the engine bearings though. I never leave my manual vehicles loaded in gear when off. It's pointlessly hard on the bearings. Starting is already harsh enough in that brief moment before oil pressure builds. Why add insult to injury? There are oil pressure accumulators on the market in part for maintaining oil pressure when off for friendlier starting of high compression race engines: https://www.cantonracingproducts.com/accusump https://www.cantonracingproducts.com/accusump
- yvrev 7y ago
  Extra safety + in winter handbrake can freeze stuck
- leeoniya 7y ago
  i prefer to leave it in gear rather than hand brake (unless on grade) to avoid the handbrake becoming less effective over time as the cable stretches. this happened in my 2005 mazda 3 and the habit carried over to my 2017 Golf (not sure if the brake design is similar or not, maybe it's not necessary on the vw)
  - babayega2 7y ago
    It's a recipe for disaster. You prefer convenience over safety? You better put it in gear and then handbrake. One day my car was in only gear, neutral and a kid made it roll few feets by just playing inside the car. I'm afraid as hell since then.
    - ComputerGuru 7y ago
      > was in only gear, neutral So was it in gear or was it in neutral?
      - leeoniya 7y ago
        sounds like the kid popped it out of gear?
        asdff 7y ago
        Did the kid reach into the car and move the stick past the gate? Otherwise I'm not sure how you can pop a car out of gear.
  - ptaipale 7y ago
    That's generally not a good idea. Cable stretch is not a problem, it can be adjusted (and generally modern cars often have a self-adjust system for handbrake cable, even for manual handbrakes). Handbrake should be used to keep it effective (so that the cable moves regularly and does not get stuck). And, if the gear is released accidentally, you still have the brake, and vice versa. (Myself, I have always parked with handbrake on + gear in 1st or reverse; nowadays with my VW it's pretty automatic because it's DSG and you have to put the selector to P to take the key out, and electric parking brake activates automatically.)
- martin_bech 7y ago
  Also chiming in from Denmark, thats how you park a stick. Engine off, set it in 1st gear, and pull the handbrake.
- varjag 7y ago
  Because that's how you are supposed to do it. Parking in either handbrake or in gear alone is not reliable.
  - ComputerGuru 7y ago
    They’re both reliable, the odds of either mechanism failing with the car at rest are slim. What’s not reliable is remembering to do it and making sure you did it right; doing both helps with that.
    - PinguTS 7y ago
      That is not true. There are situations where one or the other could fail, especially on a hill. A car in gear can be moved. That is a way how I start an engine for example. Also depending on weather and temperature the handbrake can fail.
      - ComputerGuru 7y ago
        > That is a way how I start an engine for example. I’ve never seen anyone successfully start an engine from stand-still with it in gear (though I’ve seen people try). You get it rolling in neutral and only then engage the gear to start the engine without a starter or battery.
    - pertymcpert 7y ago
      No, not non-existent. The handbrake can and do fail over time.
    - pfranz 7y ago
      I've had the car roll when I thought the handbrake was engaged. The pull-levers aren't binary, so sometimes people don't pull them enough (I sometimes get others complaining I pulled it too far and it's difficult for them to release). Other times they seem to get warn down...I've caught people driving with them still engaged.
    - inferiorhuman 7y ago
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  AFAIK in Poland, it's common knowledge among experienced drivers you should park on gear in lieu of handbrake in winter and/or a wet weather, especially if you plan to keep the car parked for more than a couple of hours. We didn't know it until recently, which is how we ended up with blocked rear wheels after the car stayed parked for a couple of days, one of which was rainy. The process of unlocking the wheels damaged the brakes, so we also ended up with two visits to repair shop (one to hot-fix them before a trip home, another to fix them properly).
  - spongeb00b 7y ago
    I left my first car parked on my sloped drive for 2 weeks while on holiday. When trying to drive it for the first time I found the handbrake seized on. My dad was all “give it more gas” to try and free it while reversing down the drive. Suddenly there was a bang and jolt and the sound of escaping air. The front spring had been pulled until snapped and punctured the tyre...
    - TeMPOraL 7y ago
      In that situation I mentioned, our uncle (an experienced driver) helped us unlock the wheels by essentially making the car rock back and forth. Standing outside, I was horrified - I didn't even realize the suspension system has such a large range of motion, and I'm pretty sure that if I tried to reproduce it on a toy car, I'd break it into pieces. But after few minutes of this dance, with two loud bangs, the brake disks let go and the stuck wheels started to rotate. We drove the car straight to the mechanic after that.
    - salawat 7y ago
      Out of curiosity; why force it if you suspect it of being frozen on? I'd get an extension cord and a hair dryer/heat gun and warm the brake cable/linkages and rear brake assembly. You'd just have to get it warm enough to get an ice fracture started, then the force of actuating the brake should do the rest if it's an old fashioned one. Just be careful, and make sure your electrical cord is in good condition, and you should be fine. Bonus points in that you get an excuse to nab the Mrs./Ms. hair dryer for a good laugh when someone inevitably sees you giving your car a good blow down. I'd be incredibly leery of trying to force anything through engine output/mechanical vibration alone. Always try undoing the environmental complication first. It's much less prone to causing costly repairs, and easier to do than it seems. A car cover that goes to the ground, and a beefy enough space heater underneath the cover in the morning might do the trick too. Although winds can make the heat gun/hair dryer + point heating work better. Brake fluid doesn't freeze, but any water it manages to have pulled out of the air will. In fact if you have too much water in your brake lines from moisture absorption from the atmosphere because you were fiddling with the master cylinder, or using fluid that had a chance to absorb significant moisture, you could get large enough concentrations of water to get some crystallization started. Normally though, hydraulic brake systems in good condition shouldn't have a problem with that. In the unlikely event you do, the amount of ice shouldn't threaten the physical integrity of the system, and warming the brake lines would resolve it. Note that having enough water for that to happen gas probably made your braking sponge though, and you should really flush your brakes at that point when you get a good dry day.
- macrolime 7y ago
  Handbrake can freeze and get stuck in the winter. Unless it's very cold it's best to use first and hand brake as each may fail by themselves leaving the car rolling.I once put on the hand brake and neutral and when I came out of the shop my car had crashed into another car as the hand brake had gotten broken. Now I always use first plus handbrake.
  - semi-extrinsic 7y ago
    In my experience, at least manual handbrakes tend to freeze in the "brake engaged" position. If it's frozen in the "brake disengaged" position, you won't be able to turn it on, and you definitely notice it (the lever won't budge then). Not sure how this applies to electric hand brakes, but I would hope they have a sensor to detect if the motor has engaged the brake or if it's just stalled out.
- gambiting 7y ago
  Wait, what? I come from a country where 99% of cars are manual, and you are taught to always park in both first gear and put the handbrake on. One of these can fail independently of the other and the car still won't roll if you do that.
- michaelscott 7y ago
  The assumption is that the handbrake could snap and if the car is on any sort of incline being in first gear will prevent it from sliding. If it wouldn't slide without a handbrake then you don't need to use it in the first place.
- Unklejoe 7y ago
  My 2002 Maxima (manual) used the rear disk brake as the e-brake (unlike most other cars that have a separate drum e-brake). The issue there is that as the car cooled off, the disk contracted and the e-brake would lose grip. Learned the hard way when I saw my car in the middle of the street one day. Left it in gear every time after that.
- asdff 7y ago
  In gear is fine. The engine wouldn't be able to turn over. You'd need a serious hill, like 45*, to have a car bump start without gaining speed in neutral first.
  - mikestew 7y ago
    Depends on the car. Our '81 VW camper is loosy-goosy enough that without the parking brake it will creep its way down our angled-but-not-anywhere-near-45-degrees driveway. On any kind of an incline, I don't trust the compression leakage on even a new car. But that's for manuals that rely on engine compression to to hold them in place. Automatics (at least the ones I've torn apart) have a pin to lock the transmission, and not rely on rolling up against engine compression.
- mikestew 7y ago
  So, you only have single point of failure (parking brake) holding your car back from rolling down the road? No, leave it in gear when you park. I mean, why wouldn't you leave it in gear? If you think you're saving wear on something, you're probably wrong.
- perl4ever 7y ago
  I took for granted that the right way is in first and with the handbrake on, because with a typical FWD car, I believe the handbrake stops the rear wheels and the engine's inertia stops the front wheels.
userbinator 7y ago
A manual transmission would've stalled the engine the first time it hit, but it sounds like the car moved and hit the guy once, others saw and pushed it backwards, and then it moved forwards and hit the guy again.
- asdff 7y ago
  Sounds like an automatic in drive
inferiorhuman 7y ago
In San Francisco signs dictate you do three things: curb your wheels, park in gear, set the parking brake. Hasn't failed me yet. If I'm facing uphill I'll usually leave the car in reverse instead of first though. https://c8.alamy.com/comp/B79ANK/san-francisco-california-street-signs-on-steep-hill-B79ANK.jpg https://c8.alamy.com/comp/B79ANK/san-francisco-california-st...
- zebnyc 7y ago
  what about manual tranmission? Fellow SF resident asking. Thanks
  - arijun 7y ago
    Sounds like he's talking about manual transmission--in an automatic, you can't take out the keys if it's in drive (nor would you want to, as "park" is better for parking)
- arijun 7y ago
  Why wouldn't you always leave the car in reverse? It has a lower gear ratio than 1st.
  - eknkc 7y ago
    Probably has a higher chance to mess up the transmission in case of a load (small impact) due to that lower gear ratio.
  - londons_explore 7y ago
    Reverse typically has a higher gear ratio than first. Normally between 1st and 2nd in terms of ratio.
  - inferiorhuman 7y ago
    Why wouldn't you always leave the car in reverse? If I'm worried about the car rolling, I don't particularly want it turning the engine backwards. In terms of ratios I don't give it much thought. On pretty much every car I've driven first gear is shorter than reverse (typically first is > 4:1 vs reverse at < 4:1).
ignoramous 7y ago
> It's unclear why the car would have rolled forward, since the remote system is not supposed to work unless the vehicle has been placed in park. > "I've never heard of this happening before," a police spokesperson told Gothamist. > Multiple inquiries to Lexus were not returned. I hope a software bug that missed checking for neutral in an avoidable edge-case isn't what's responsible for the young man's life. Lexus should respond to add clarity as to what really happened.
- fingerlocks 7y ago
  Given the year of the vehicle, this is probably an after-market remote starting kit. These are simple radio devices hard wired into the ignition, and can be purchased for $100 on Amazon. There's little to no software involved at all.

ComputerGuru 7y ago

I’m always confused when someone parks my car and I find they parked it in first rather than neutral plus the handbrake (High gradients excepted, where both should be used regardless of preference). People that learn it one way will never do it the other. (Also, yes, the 2002 IS300 was available in stick.)

epanchin 7y ago
In the UK where stick is normal, we’re taught to park in gear + handbrake. The handbrake can start slipping when the brakes cool and the car could roll, so both are necessary, especially on a hill.
- StrangeSound 7y ago
  Anecdotally [UK], I can't say that I nor anyone that I've noticed ever park in gear. With parking on hills being the only exception.
  - gerdesj 7y ago
    Anecdotally (UK), I do sometimes park in gear as well as the hand brake and I know others. I evaluate the situation first and use the appropriate combination. It may sound a bit excessive but a mental risk assessment takes seconds.
  - zelos 7y ago
    My UK driving instructor told me I should park with the car in reverse gear if you're pointing down a hill. I was never quite sure of the logic behind that.
    - wccrawford 7y ago
      Someone above was worried about "running the engine in reverse" when using reverse gear, so I'm guessing the idea is to match the direction the car will roll if something happens.
- _ZeD_ 7y ago
  same in italy.
- LatteLazy 7y ago
  I wasn't (test passed in 2009 I think). And that was in Exeter (very hilly area). Only if it's very steep were we told we could do that...
- reallydontask 7y ago
  Same advice given to me in Spain (circa 2001)
climb_stealth 7y ago
I have been taught to park cars in first gear and pull the handbrake as well. And along the same line to always check that the car is in neutral before starting it. Maybe it is not current anymore, but I have always been instilled a certain distrust of handbrakes. :)
- scoofy 7y ago
  Handbrake first, let car rest, then set in first gear. If you do it the other way around, you're resting the gears under load.
  - adrianN 7y ago
    Why is that bad? The gears surely take orders of magnitude more load in a moving car.
    - pfranz 7y ago
      I always imagined it was a sustained load on a few teeth of the gear instead of constantly distributed as the gears turn.
      - AndrewThrowaway 7y ago
        I wonder what would be the load compared to a speeding car. Lets say car is standing on 10% incline, first gear, something like three teeth engaged. What is the load to one teeth? Now lets say you have started the car and accelerate it to something like 30km/h in this incline before changing to second gear. What was the load to one tooth in the time of acceleration?
      - newnewpdro 7y ago
        There's basically no compression when an engine isn't running at least at hundreds of RPMs. It's a non-issue for the gears. You can turn a 4-cylinder crank with your bare hands. There's very little load, you're just overcoming the static friction of bearings, piston rings, and compressing valve springs. At the static to creeping rate we're talking, the cylinder fluids leak right through the piston ring gaps. If you want to worry about something with regard to statically loading everything, it's a lack of lubrication that should worry you. The engine isn't maintaining oil pressure when stopped. So you're leaving the crank bearings loaded in one spot while oil slowly squeezes out. "Frictionless" oil film bearings are made of relatively soft metals, so this isn't exactly good for the engine. Also the gearbox isn't dispersing oil as it does when driving. So the gears are slowly drying up while loaded. I'd be more concerned about the engine bearings though. I never leave my manual vehicles loaded in gear when off. It's pointlessly hard on the bearings. Starting is already harsh enough in that brief moment before oil pressure builds. Why add insult to injury? There are oil pressure accumulators on the market in part for maintaining oil pressure when off for friendlier starting of high compression race engines: https://www.cantonracingproducts.com/accusump https://www.cantonracingproducts.com/accusump
yvrev 7y ago
Extra safety + in winter handbrake can freeze stuck
leeoniya 7y ago
i prefer to leave it in gear rather than hand brake (unless on grade) to avoid the handbrake becoming less effective over time as the cable stretches. this happened in my 2005 mazda 3 and the habit carried over to my 2017 Golf (not sure if the brake design is similar or not, maybe it's not necessary on the vw)
- babayega2 7y ago
  It's a recipe for disaster. You prefer convenience over safety? You better put it in gear and then handbrake. One day my car was in only gear, neutral and a kid made it roll few feets by just playing inside the car. I'm afraid as hell since then.
  - ComputerGuru 7y ago
    > was in only gear, neutral So was it in gear or was it in neutral?
    - leeoniya 7y ago
      sounds like the kid popped it out of gear?
      - asdff 7y ago
        Did the kid reach into the car and move the stick past the gate? Otherwise I'm not sure how you can pop a car out of gear.
- ptaipale 7y ago
  That's generally not a good idea. Cable stretch is not a problem, it can be adjusted (and generally modern cars often have a self-adjust system for handbrake cable, even for manual handbrakes). Handbrake should be used to keep it effective (so that the cable moves regularly and does not get stuck). And, if the gear is released accidentally, you still have the brake, and vice versa. (Myself, I have always parked with handbrake on + gear in 1st or reverse; nowadays with my VW it's pretty automatic because it's DSG and you have to put the selector to P to take the key out, and electric parking brake activates automatically.)
martin_bech 7y ago
Also chiming in from Denmark, thats how you park a stick. Engine off, set it in 1st gear, and pull the handbrake.
varjag 7y ago
Because that's how you are supposed to do it. Parking in either handbrake or in gear alone is not reliable.
- ComputerGuru 7y ago
  They’re both reliable, the odds of either mechanism failing with the car at rest are slim. What’s not reliable is remembering to do it and making sure you did it right; doing both helps with that.
  - PinguTS 7y ago
    That is not true. There are situations where one or the other could fail, especially on a hill. A car in gear can be moved. That is a way how I start an engine for example. Also depending on weather and temperature the handbrake can fail.
    - ComputerGuru 7y ago
      > That is a way how I start an engine for example. I’ve never seen anyone successfully start an engine from stand-still with it in gear (though I’ve seen people try). You get it rolling in neutral and only then engage the gear to start the engine without a starter or battery.
  - pertymcpert 7y ago
    No, not non-existent. The handbrake can and do fail over time.
  - pfranz 7y ago
    I've had the car roll when I thought the handbrake was engaged. The pull-levers aren't binary, so sometimes people don't pull them enough (I sometimes get others complaining I pulled it too far and it's difficult for them to release). Other times they seem to get warn down...I've caught people driving with them still engaged.
  - inferiorhuman 7y ago
TeMPOraL 7y ago
AFAIK in Poland, it's common knowledge among experienced drivers you should park on gear in lieu of handbrake in winter and/or a wet weather, especially if you plan to keep the car parked for more than a couple of hours. We didn't know it until recently, which is how we ended up with blocked rear wheels after the car stayed parked for a couple of days, one of which was rainy. The process of unlocking the wheels damaged the brakes, so we also ended up with two visits to repair shop (one to hot-fix them before a trip home, another to fix them properly).
- spongeb00b 7y ago
  I left my first car parked on my sloped drive for 2 weeks while on holiday. When trying to drive it for the first time I found the handbrake seized on. My dad was all “give it more gas” to try and free it while reversing down the drive. Suddenly there was a bang and jolt and the sound of escaping air. The front spring had been pulled until snapped and punctured the tyre...
  - TeMPOraL 7y ago
    In that situation I mentioned, our uncle (an experienced driver) helped us unlock the wheels by essentially making the car rock back and forth. Standing outside, I was horrified - I didn't even realize the suspension system has such a large range of motion, and I'm pretty sure that if I tried to reproduce it on a toy car, I'd break it into pieces. But after few minutes of this dance, with two loud bangs, the brake disks let go and the stuck wheels started to rotate. We drove the car straight to the mechanic after that.
  - salawat 7y ago
    Out of curiosity; why force it if you suspect it of being frozen on? I'd get an extension cord and a hair dryer/heat gun and warm the brake cable/linkages and rear brake assembly. You'd just have to get it warm enough to get an ice fracture started, then the force of actuating the brake should do the rest if it's an old fashioned one. Just be careful, and make sure your electrical cord is in good condition, and you should be fine. Bonus points in that you get an excuse to nab the Mrs./Ms. hair dryer for a good laugh when someone inevitably sees you giving your car a good blow down. I'd be incredibly leery of trying to force anything through engine output/mechanical vibration alone. Always try undoing the environmental complication first. It's much less prone to causing costly repairs, and easier to do than it seems. A car cover that goes to the ground, and a beefy enough space heater underneath the cover in the morning might do the trick too. Although winds can make the heat gun/hair dryer + point heating work better. Brake fluid doesn't freeze, but any water it manages to have pulled out of the air will. In fact if you have too much water in your brake lines from moisture absorption from the atmosphere because you were fiddling with the master cylinder, or using fluid that had a chance to absorb significant moisture, you could get large enough concentrations of water to get some crystallization started. Normally though, hydraulic brake systems in good condition shouldn't have a problem with that. In the unlikely event you do, the amount of ice shouldn't threaten the physical integrity of the system, and warming the brake lines would resolve it. Note that having enough water for that to happen gas probably made your braking sponge though, and you should really flush your brakes at that point when you get a good dry day.
macrolime 7y ago
Handbrake can freeze and get stuck in the winter. Unless it's very cold it's best to use first and hand brake as each may fail by themselves leaving the car rolling.I once put on the hand brake and neutral and when I came out of the shop my car had crashed into another car as the hand brake had gotten broken. Now I always use first plus handbrake.
- semi-extrinsic 7y ago
  In my experience, at least manual handbrakes tend to freeze in the "brake engaged" position. If it's frozen in the "brake disengaged" position, you won't be able to turn it on, and you definitely notice it (the lever won't budge then). Not sure how this applies to electric hand brakes, but I would hope they have a sensor to detect if the motor has engaged the brake or if it's just stalled out.
gambiting 7y ago
Wait, what? I come from a country where 99% of cars are manual, and you are taught to always park in both first gear and put the handbrake on. One of these can fail independently of the other and the car still won't roll if you do that.
michaelscott 7y ago
The assumption is that the handbrake could snap and if the car is on any sort of incline being in first gear will prevent it from sliding. If it wouldn't slide without a handbrake then you don't need to use it in the first place.
Unklejoe 7y ago
My 2002 Maxima (manual) used the rear disk brake as the e-brake (unlike most other cars that have a separate drum e-brake). The issue there is that as the car cooled off, the disk contracted and the e-brake would lose grip. Learned the hard way when I saw my car in the middle of the street one day. Left it in gear every time after that.
asdff 7y ago
In gear is fine. The engine wouldn't be able to turn over. You'd need a serious hill, like 45*, to have a car bump start without gaining speed in neutral first.
- mikestew 7y ago
  Depends on the car. Our '81 VW camper is loosy-goosy enough that without the parking brake it will creep its way down our angled-but-not-anywhere-near-45-degrees driveway. On any kind of an incline, I don't trust the compression leakage on even a new car. But that's for manuals that rely on engine compression to to hold them in place. Automatics (at least the ones I've torn apart) have a pin to lock the transmission, and not rely on rolling up against engine compression.
mikestew 7y ago
So, you only have single point of failure (parking brake) holding your car back from rolling down the road? No, leave it in gear when you park. I mean, why wouldn't you leave it in gear? If you think you're saving wear on something, you're probably wrong.
perl4ever 7y ago
I took for granted that the right way is in first and with the handbrake on, because with a typical FWD car, I believe the handbrake stops the rear wheels and the engine's inertia stops the front wheels.

userbinator 7y ago

A manual transmission would've stalled the engine the first time it hit, but it sounds like the car moved and hit the guy once, others saw and pushed it backwards, and then it moved forwards and hit the guy again.

asdff 7y ago
Sounds like an automatic in drive

inferiorhuman 7y ago

In San Francisco signs dictate you do three things: curb your wheels, park in gear, set the parking brake. Hasn't failed me yet. If I'm facing uphill I'll usually leave the car in reverse instead of first though. https://c8.alamy.com/comp/B79ANK/san-francisco-california-street-signs-on-steep-hill-B79ANK.jpg https://c8.alamy.com/comp/B79ANK/san-francisco-california-st...

zebnyc 7y ago
what about manual tranmission? Fellow SF resident asking. Thanks
- arijun 7y ago
  Sounds like he's talking about manual transmission--in an automatic, you can't take out the keys if it's in drive (nor would you want to, as "park" is better for parking)
arijun 7y ago
Why wouldn't you always leave the car in reverse? It has a lower gear ratio than 1st.
- eknkc 7y ago
  Probably has a higher chance to mess up the transmission in case of a load (small impact) due to that lower gear ratio.
- londons_explore 7y ago
  Reverse typically has a higher gear ratio than first. Normally between 1st and 2nd in terms of ratio.
- inferiorhuman 7y ago
  Why wouldn't you always leave the car in reverse? If I'm worried about the car rolling, I don't particularly want it turning the engine backwards. In terms of ratios I don't give it much thought. On pretty much every car I've driven first gear is shorter than reverse (typically first is > 4:1 vs reverse at < 4:1).

ignoramous 7y ago

> It's unclear why the car would have rolled forward, since the remote system is not supposed to work unless the vehicle has been placed in park. > "I've never heard of this happening before," a police spokesperson told Gothamist. > Multiple inquiries to Lexus were not returned. I hope a software bug that missed checking for neutral in an avoidable edge-case isn't what's responsible for the young man's life. Lexus should respond to add clarity as to what really happened.

fingerlocks 7y ago
Given the year of the vehicle, this is probably an after-market remote starting kit. These are simple radio devices hard wired into the ignition, and can be purchased for $100 on Amazon. There's little to no software involved at all.